


Because Dean

by drvology



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, SPN - Freeform, Weecest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2017-12-10
Packaged: 2019-02-12 22:26:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12969705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drvology/pseuds/drvology
Summary: In a brief moment of weakness Sam thinks—I wish it could be me and Dean just me and Dean and no one would see no one would care no one would know.





	Because Dean

**Author's Note:**

  * For [deirdre_c](https://archiveofourown.org/users/deirdre_c/gifts).



> Last I knew, the help Puerto Rico auction raised over $19,000 in pledged donations for ConPRmetidos. WOW <3 Good work, fandom.

Sam runs hard as he can. He almost loses his footing on the steep slope, clumps of pine needles giving way in slithery masses, and he stops from tumbling headfirst by shouldering painfully into a tree. The comparatively thin trunk shudders and it knocks the wind from him but he doesn't pause, just keeps running.

At the bottom he overruns, ends up in the middle of the shallow but swift watercourse threading this narrow crease-cut valley, but he pivots and churns through water and rock until he's back on muddy red-orange ground and hurrying into the darker purple shadows.

There's no sound but his thundering pulse and no feeling on his clammy skin. He slows to a trot he nears a waterfall overhang, skirts the spray and ducks past the rough honeycomb of umber-striped crags and coils sculpted over the centuries by the water's inexorable drive.

Past the overhang a grotto takes shape as his eyes adjust. He sets his feet and hips to match, takes stock.

Mary—a delicately carved statue placed here generations ago—is silent and still, hands open in welcome, wreathed in fairy lights. The tiny shimmering circles are sunlight glinting off coins and refraction, nothing more, but the effect is momentarily distracting—magical. The water, the sinister force here, murmurs and echoes in the cave. Sam tries not to hear its dangerous whisper.

Warmth flushes over him and he can smell roses. He's swoony, from running so fast, from coming to such an abrupt halt he tells himself. He sways on his feet.

This place is a miracle, it's said. Come here and pray for your heart's desire and see it delivered. Clear sweet spring where one shouldn't be found. A miracle, Sam thinks, and flirts at the edges of wanting for a few of his own.

Sam's breath catches as his gaze snags on Dean. Moving, coming into the light from behind the statue, and it grounds him, rights him. The miracle is a trick, ruinous in the end, inescapable as given but contorted, a prison, a penalty. Their eyes meet—Sam doesn't even question how, no matter this dark place and its sinuous hold on the senses—and nods.

He's not supposed to be down here but he can't be anywhere else, because Dean is down here. He's supposed to be above, waiting for a signal or whatever, but he couldn't keep away. Urgent warnings had ripped from his center out, not to be ignored. Stronger than Dad's angry, clipped command he'd better stay put for once, like he was told. Sam's actually pretty good at doing what he's told, but not when Dean's very life is in play.

Never that. Never then.

Dean shakes his head once, short and curt, but he's not upset. He motions for continued quiet and then disappears, coated in shadow as he kneels before the statue.

Mary is in place of the water naiad who was in place of an ancient native power. But it isn't Mary—it isn't anything good. The natives marked this spring as sacred to keep its people away. Everyone else after misunderstood, paid reverence and tithes but not heed, supplicants and thrill-seekers lost ever since.

Sam listens to Dean's incantation, spoken barely above breath and ringing clearly in his mind. There's words to be said and Dean works his way through each. There's words anyone who enters here should take pains—be desperate to avoid and terrified to speak—and Dean says none of them.

The statue begins to rumble. Mary shakes, face distorting, granite melting in lacy, molten strings that begin to pool around Dean. There's a hollow, choking sound. The spring bubbling up from under Mary's feet stills, pulls back, is silent as Sam counts, one… two… five… ten…

At twenty, stinking black tar erupts, dark and terrible, mixing with the ruined statue to loft billows of steam into the air.

To Sam's right there's motion and sudden sparking light—Dad, bearing weapons and fire, even though Sam argued none of those would have any effect on her. It. This malevolent entity older than time and greedier than death.

His pockets are full of the things he researched and argued as vital to completing this correctly. To truly killing—vanquishing—this beast. Things Dad scoffed at, Dad wouldn't take.

He stuffed Dean's pockets full of the same as Dean patted his shoulder—because Sam couldn't leave Dean to such chance—as Dean leaned in quick after Dad turned away from the car and where Sam was supposed to wait to push their foreheads together and say _stay safe_ _promise you'll stay safe_. Because Sam's call on Dean's promise was to exact, only if you don't listen to Dad—only if you return unharmed.

As Sam expects, Dad's rock salt and nails and fire do nothing but enrage, and the anger seems to jolt the creature's power. Dad throws his torch into the geyser of tarry yuck—it fizzles out, is consumed—as is a flask of holy water and next a shard of iron hammered into a crude knife. Dad pumps the shotgun and shoots again. Sam winces as pellets of the useless salt skiffs Dean's cheek.

Dean doesn't react. He continues speaking the incantation they perfected, hours past Dad's patience to listen to another practice run another tweak, not the least distracted by the din and destruction falling around him. As he speaks he empties his pockets—Sam had insisted and he agreed it has to be as you're finishing, not after, and get as much as you can into the spring before the words run out—pushing sachets full of the ancient recipe of elements and oil into the black mouth of the belching waters.

What remains of the statue topples, cracks over Dean's bowed head and bowed shoulders. The ground starts to shake and a high-pitched whine pierces the dark, overtakes the cave, wanting to steal their reason, the remains of their resolve.

Sam rushes in, shouts the last of the refrain Dean mutters, flinging the bitter roots and soft green herbs and biting mineral flecks he packed into cheap trouser socks at the source of the tar-water, the scream, aiming to redirect the flow, the worst of it, from Dean. He stumbles and rolls and scrabbles onto his palms, jackknifes onto his toes, lunges forward to make the final distance.

He catches sight of Dad, furious with him. He doesn't care. He lands next to Dean and they complete the incantation, together, as Sam throws the last of his bundles.

Dean's concentration finally breaks and he looks up, eyes warming in a fleeting smile for Sam.

In a brief moment of weakness Sam thinks—I wish it could be me and Dean just me and Dean and no one would see no one would care no one would know.

Dad bellows and the cave rends beneath them, and something lances his side, then Sam forgets everything in a blinding flash and the punishing grip of Dean's hand on his arm, the bruise of rocks raining down on them.

Then Sam is running again. Grappling free from the collapsing cave, tearing up the slippery, unforgiving climb out of the forested ravine, pushing Dean and being pulled by Dean and fighting not to get caught in the siphoning, shrieking rush as the shrine craters in and the monster beneath dies.

He hooks his elbows on what seems the lip of the last of the world and kicks, hauls one knee and then the other over, reaches for Dean. There's nothing—his heartbeat skips stops freezes—and then Dean's weight lands on him and he can live again.

They watch as the swift little river flows backwards, sucking into the craggy maw of what's left of the cave. They don't move until everything below is still, until the spring now clear and untroubled flows once more from the red-orange rocks, until the birds flit in close and make their normal racket.

Sam buries his head in the leaves and lets out a breath in a long, long sigh. It shakes as he breathes in, and then Dean rolls him over, green eyes and gentle hands intent on checking for injury. Sam allows it—basks in it—but goes rigid when Dean's seeking touch brushes across his ribs.

"Hey, what's this?" Dean says, more to himself. He starts working at Sam's layers, and that's when Sam sees the burns on Dean's arms—melted holes in Dean's jacket and flannel turned shiny and that's way worse than a small sting in Sam's side.

He twists to sit, grabs Dean's arms, starts an inventory of his own. Dean's jeans have holes in them too, like tiny bites, and Sam bears his teeth seeing the pinked flesh underneath.

"Do these hurt? Does this?" he asks, knuckling the shallow bloody furrow on Dean's cheek, unzipping Dean's jacket and pushing up sleeves and needing to look at the damage done. It's not as bad as he fears—his protection mix added to the sachets and spells—but there's a few marks whitened and hotter than the rest he doesn't like.

He doesn't like any of it, burning and squirming through him hot and molten like that wretched statue.

"Damn." Dean shucks out of his flannel and thermal and frowns at the peppering of wounds on his arms. "I liked that jacket. And these jeans are finally broken in just right." He uses Sam's shoulder as support and stands, quick-flash grins. "At least my boots are still okay."

Dean isn't distracted for long. He folds back up in front of Sam, makes a face as he unzips Sam's hoodie, mutters about all their clothes being ruined by that flying smelly black gunk anyway, and starts to unbutton Sam's shirt. He watches Sam's expression as he does it, gauging for reaction or pain, gaze almost drowsy as he reveals and then touches Sam's skin.

Sam shorts out a little. He's used to Dean's caretaking, used to Dean poking and prodding, but there's something oddly intimate about how close they're sitting, how far leaned in toward one another they are, how aware of every breath and touch Sam is. The narrow canyon and trees and land are quiet again—itself again—the dread pall unsettling it and clinging like false twilight at their arrival at last gone.

His middle cramps and his legs hurt from being tucked under him but he doesn't move. Sam lifts his arm as Dean guides and maneuvers him, and he lets his other hand rest on Dean's thigh.

Dean flinches, just barely, but Sam's thrall of fascination catches everything. He licks his lips because they tingle and his hands flutter because his whole body itches. Dean's pupils dilate—in concentration, with worry, with something Sam can't chase fast enough to grasp and name—and Dean smiles. Not in the way Sam longs for, the crazy bad way he tries to force his mind from, and then suddenly Dean snaps backwards and is standing.

Sam curses. Himself. If anything of his stupid ruining wants was given away. Dean for being so… everything.

Then Dad's gruff yelling penetrates and he gets up, doesn't get far, Dean's protective stance and outstretched arm keeping him held behind.

Sam can't bother to listen. He knows what's being said, the litany of blame and going over the rules, enunciated as if capitalized and important, The Rules, the plan they'd had. The plan Sam had broken. He knows what's being said and how it's being said, the blame apportioned to him and Dean because Dad is so fucked up with guilt and shame and anger most of it deflects to lash out.

It rarely reflects in, and when it does, the light is drowned in a bottle. False light, like those coins, and Sam has a hysterical moment thinking they wasted an opportunity—should have scooped up all that loot before they destroyed the grotto and the psycho killer monster that dwelled there.

He swallows hard, skips past any clunky or unwanted metaphors, but his temper spikes and his desire to yell too is getting loose, almost uncontained. Something more powerful than resentment and stubbornness fuels it, makes him see red, orange, dark purple shadows.

If he hadn't left his post it wouldn't have worked, they'd still be down there fighting, losing, and did Dad see the burns on Dean? the worst that could have happened? the very worst Sam can imagine in full technicolor awful repeating detail?

"Never disobey a direct order again. Do you hear me?"

"Never fix your bullheaded won't listen mistakes? Never save Dean's life again? Is that what 'cause that's what I hear."

Once he says that it's like the spring when it was still bad, a torrent of black and ugly and coming out of him. His side aches and throbs hotly and he balls his fists. He yells and Dad yells and Dean stands quietly in the middle. Then Dean is shushing him—him not Dad—Dean literally between them as the clunkiest, worst metaphor he can imagine.

It upsets him the most, because Dean should be on his side and should appreciate he just saved everyone's life, because Dean placates Dad and drives Sam insane.

Sam shuts up at that. Clams up, retreats, stalks angrily to the car. Dad keeps going, not satisfied by Sam's stony silence or acquiescence or Dean's so-quiet rebuke. Dean catches him, jacket and shirt in one arm, other hand closing around his wrist, shakes him and sighs tired and miserable and imploring Sam not to do this.

Instead of appeasing or even just wearing him down to agree, Sam's temper rises again. Dad hits all his sore spots, knows exactly how to wrench them so perfectly, and when the trunk pops open Sam blanks and then restarts. In a rash action grabs his backpack, one of the small duffels of rations, and is running for the third time that morning, harder and heavier than the times before.

Dean yells—finally—and Dad is silent. But Sam won't slow. He winds through trees and avoids the gravel road they came in here on and just keeps running. Far enough away so when he looks back there's nothing but trees and forest sounds, he gets his backpack on and straps the duffel across his chest and settles into an energy-preserving jog.

At the end of the day as true night is falling he's still going. The temperature warmed, to almost hot, as he left the forested canyons, and he's weary but determined. Along the way he follows the path of least resistance, sees a house that leads to a country road that leads to asphalt that leads to a crossroad gas station. Since Dean is probably really pissed and he's well past following orders, he hitches for a ride, manages a not-creepy trucker doing a last leg into Flagstaff.

He says the truck stop is fine, and it is, because he buys a shower, scrubs at the sore in his side until it strafes and gives way to that unerring feeling of clean, dresses under a heat lamp on full blast. A hot meal is amazing and he slurps down a gallon of water, leaves with a gigantic cup of coffee. No one really notices him and that's also fine. He skirts the edges as he's trained to be good at but also as comes naturally, head down and blending in and making no fuss. That approach navigates him without friction through the truck stop, into town, eyes on a likely place to crash, and then into the back side of a quiet motel people have either moved into and never left or forgotten.

Sam breaks into one of the tiny cabins attached to the motel property. He leaves the lights off and sleeps in his underwear and tries not to make a mess. Well into the morning he wakes, discovers the cramped, hand-written sign the owner-manager taped to the office door, a medical emergency taking them from here but call this number if there's trouble.

Sam decides not to be any.

He hurries back to the cabin and unpacks, takes stock of his rations and counts out the days it will last him, and thinks he has to decide what to do. Nothing presents itself. He's not quite sure why he ran and is still bent on staying away other than being fed up—a feeling and feeding a compulsion he can't quite shake. He's determined not to be lonely but he is, deep within, because Dean isn't here.

The television gets three stations with static and he puts ointment on his side, warm under his fingertips but not feverish or puffy, and goes to bed early. In the morning there's noise outside the back door and Sam stays quiet in bed and listens, trying to get a sense of what's out there. There's not a lot to go on and he tiptoes to the window, peeks out and peers every direction but doesn't see anything, relieved there's no one here to kick him out or arrest him for trespassing.

Sam wants milk and hot dogs and something to do. He finds all three at a nearby convenience mart, stashes the milk and hot dogs and a block of cheese in the tiny fridge, then finishes the crypto-gram and puzzle book sitting on the short concrete steps that lead into the scrubby field behind the cabin. There's tall pines in the mid-distance, and far out, the mountains he ran from.

He hears the noise again and movement to go with it, low and sentient and definitely alive. It startles Sam and then he laughs, relief breaking over him at the sight of a dog slinking curiously toward him. Sam stands and the dog halts, so he crouches back down, and then after a moment he ducks inside and grabs a hot dog.

He tears bits off and talks as he throws them in shorter and shorter arcs, bringing the dog to him, talking the whole way in conversational nonsense. Almost to the reach of his fingertips he has only the end of the hot dog left and he risks holding it out, holds motionless, and the dog whines but then gives in, sniffing his hand before licking it and last bite away.

Sam manages to brush the dog's forehead before it shies back.

"Whoa, sorry. Just saying hello. Hey, buddy, hey," he rambles, so happy for company and a dog it fills his empty chest and uncertainty with warmth.

The dog—looks like a retriever of some sort, with intelligent eyes that assess him—decides he's not so bad and settles into a watchful, but resting pose. They stay that way as the sun lowers and starts to tuck in behind the horizon. The dog stretches and stands, then studies Sam, glancing to the trees and back to Sam several times, leaning that way but unwilling to leave.

Sam scares the dog into leaving when he reaches out again and rubs a soft, silky ear between his fingers. He stands, hands on hips, and sighs, but he calls softly, "Come back tomorrow—I'll get you some real food."

He's awake super early but there's no sign of the dog. Sam goes for a walk, into the trees, and he knows he's being followed. He whistles and sings and talks, grins when the dog shows itself, laughs as the dog follows him back to the cabin.

"Just, wait here," he says inanely and goes inside. "I didn't get food like I said, but you can have another of these, okay buddy?" he asks, ripping up a microwaved hot dog and leaving the pieces on the bottom step.

The dog stares at him almost like—are you kidding me?—but the dog huffs and nods and eats it, licks Sam's hand clean.

Sam scoots down to the middle step and the dog doesn't shy away. He leans forward and the dog lets him touch, and the touch turns into long, slow pets, until the dog is leaning heavily against him and they're both yawning. Sam does a quick check—hey boy, he whispers, laughs at himself—and tells the dog about how he came to be here.

He still doesn't know what he's going to do or how livid Dad is by this point, but he does know he'll find Dean again. Or Dean will find him. Not because it's an agreement or code or whatever, but because he can't go the rest of his life having left, just like that, without another word spoken.

Without another glance, another inhale of Dean's hair while sharing a bed and sneaking a sleep-pretended cuddle, without the sound of his name in Dean's breath.

Sam blinks and raises his head from the dog's and he ruffles fur this way and that. He's made good progress, but when he stands the dog gruffs and hops back, suddenly spooked again.

After the dog scampers away Sam stays put, hoping for it to return, but there's no sign. He goes inside—he'll get a bone tomorrow, entice the dog inside with him—and watches grainy basketball before falling asleep.

He wakes too early for stores to be open and drinks coffee standing in the window scanning the field. At nine he goes a bit farther than the convenience store and finds a grocery store, gets cereal and bread and ham, a bone from the meat counter and a small bag of dog food, walks back to the cabin on the lookout for the dog. The world is muted and slow and he continues to go unremarked upon. For today the quiet, the lack of scrutiny and lack of needing to hide, is welcome change.

Sam leaves the bone just inside the cabin's back door and leaves the door open, and he digs a notebook from his backpack and practices Latin conjugation.

He wants to pounce when the dog appears, sniffing and snuffling and teething at the bone, but he remains unmoving, until the dog steps gingerly over the threshold, looks around and then looks at him balefully, but then settles down to gnaw at the bone.

Sam grins—triumph and gladness for the company—and keeps at his work. It's afternoon when he uncramps from his position and the dog doesn't mind him. He makes more coffee and eats a ham sandwich and turns on the cheap radio, finds the public station with smart stories and soothing music, and sits in the cabin's one not-really comfortable easy chair.

Something wet nudges his hand and he blinks, looks down into green eyes and the relaxed face of the dog, and Sam nearly cries, a clash of accomplishment and need and satisfaction. The dog grins—Bones he thinks, got you with a bone—and curls on his feet. They sit until it's dark and he has another ham sandwich for dinner, and Bones stays on the floor next to the door Sam decides to leave open, even though he patted the bed and promised it would be okay.

The next morning Bones is still there and Sam wants to shout. Instead he rolls out of bed and gives Bones a good side thumping. He has a granola bar and ignores Bones' intent stare—ignores the weird sensation of familiarity in the focused gaze—and fills his camp bowl with dog food.

Bones smells it, curls his lip, but sighs and eats it down.

Sam laughs. "I spoiled you with the hot dogs. Wanna go for a walk?" he asks, voice rising on the question.

Bones dances and then shoots out the back door and Sam has to shove his feet into his shoes and race to follow. They spend the whole day rambling, flushing birds from bunchgrass and avoiding other people and napping in the cool shadow of a pinion pine leaned on a boulder facing the mountains past the outskirts of town.

Sam washes his clothes while he showers, drapes them over every surface, and Bones curls up to sleep next to the bed after Sam experimentally closes the back door.

They fall into a companionable rhythm, and Sam is so grateful to have Bones—to actually have a dog even if it's only temporary—tells himself not to get too attached or fall in love because it is only temporary. He doesn't know how to get in contact with his father and aches to talk to Dean but he has decided it's best he stays put. If he wanders and they're out looking for him, they're sure to miss one another—staying here, near the place he bolted from, he just might be thought of as here to be found.

He tries not to dwell on it having been a week and no word.

Sam expected to be guilty or afraid but all he has is this strange calm surety that running and staying hidden is what he had to do.

He walks them to grocery and then around the corner, remembering the ad for a used bookstore pinned to the grocery's corkboard hung in its stuffy vestibule. Sam calls as he enters and Bones slips in ahead of him, no big deal, but there's no answer. He hears a television from a room behind the counter and decides it doesn't matter—he doesn't want to be bothered while he browses anyway.

The bookstore is squat and dim, goes back and back more than he'd have figured, and crammed every which way on a hodgepodge assembly of shelves and spinning eyeglass racks and dressers without drawers and curio cabinets without glass. In the far corner he finds a long card table, bowed in the middle with 1x4s nailed to the sides sticking up over the top, framing in a strain of paperbacks marked 10c each or 25 for two-dollars.

Sam gets 25.

He doesn't allow himself to wander more, doesn't want to be tempted by something more expensive, not even a two-dollar book when two dollars can get him so much. He picks out sci-fi and fantasy, some westerns, nonfiction about wars and earthworks and memoirs that sound interesting enough. Sam's not picky, but with enough to choose from he doesn't take just anything, discusses options with Bones who evinces strong opinions on which ones.

No one answers when he stands at the counter so he leaves two dollar bills slid under the stapler. There's probably no inventory for these books so he doesn't worry over that, stuffs his haul into his backpack, elated anticipation singing through him on their walk back to the cabin.

Sam stacks the books on the table in the order he thinks he wants to read them, makes coffee, and Bones sidles against him to gnaw at the bone after he settles on the back steps. Sam pets Bones' dark honey-blond hair and gets lost in the book and for that night is content.

He reads his way through the books, goes on long rambles allowing Bones to lead them along, tells Bones everything. That he's a hunter, basically an orphan, a solider, exhausted and stuck here without knowing quite why and in love with his older brother.

Not hero-worship or socially awkward and hides in his brother's company and coolness love, but hopelessly infatuated, crushing, longing, wanting, horny for, where's their sunset to walk hand-in-hand into as credit music plays love.

Bones listens, pauses to lick his hand and look up at him, green eyes almost sad, and Sam sighs and laughs at himself and gets them moving again. After that he stops talking.

As the days go on Sam's contentment fades and Bones' disconcerting alertness fades with it. He drifts like a ghost, no one seeming to see him—no motel manager appearing to demand payment or chasing him off, no indication the bored convenience store clerk getting something from the stock room noticed as he grabbed a six-pack of beer and left six dollars on the counter, no one in this rundown side of town caring as he and Bones walked past.

Sam wonders if he's disappearing, if he's imagining Bones, if Dean is out there looking for him as feverishly as Dean occupies his thoughts now that the adrenaline and otherness of running, being on his own, has worn off and let them back in. Pervasive, desperate, twisting him up with yearning.

The world gets even quieter and he doesn't turn on the radio, steps slowing on their walks, the wind no longer sharp and cool and the rustle of leaves sounding as if he's still inside. Food loses its taste and he swears the sunsets are leached of color. Bones sticks close to him, gets on the bed at night, but it's a hollow victory.

One night he tries to read but his concentration wanes and he's listless but not tired enough to sleep. He stretches out on the floor and scratches at his side—it itches again and throbs hotly and he should get up and look, clean it out—and Bones ambles over and drops down beside him. Sam curls them together, breathes into Bones' warm neck, and wishes Dean would find him.

He'd even trade Bones for it. More, he'd trade having to endure Dad again, just to clap eyes on Dean.

He wakes creaky and sore in bed, and after a thick minute, sits upright because Bones has to be let out and fed and paid attention to.

"Hey, whoa whoa," Dean says, takes hold of Sam's shoulders, gets Sam to lay back down. He wipes Sam's forehead with a cloth and drinks in the sight of Sam, green eyes shimmering with fatigue and what might be tears. "Hey, Sammy," he whispers, lowers to rest his forehead to Sam's.

Sam wraps an arm around Dean, tangles his hand in Dean's hair, and he sobs on a broken breath.

Dean pats Sam, gentles his upset with soft words, and when Sam finally doesn't protest him moving he sinks down, sliding to kneel next to the bed. He swallows and smiles, shallow, and there's shadows in his eyes.

"Hi."

Sam blinks, can't believe it, traces Dean's features with a fingertip. "Hi," he says after too long because he's forgotten how to speak.

He sits up carefully and Dean lets him. His side pulls and he remembers the heat, the discomfort, but that's all gone. He frowns and then looks at Dean, knows Dean made him better and will have the answer.

"You had a shard of something in you—black and thin, kinda like glass. You got most of it when you cleaned it, but just enough stayed dug in and gave you a fever." Dean can't seem to keep from touching Sam, hand on Sam's thigh, other hand lifting the hem of Sam's loose sleepshirt—Dean's shirt—to check the wound. "I got it out and the infection cleared right up, but you've been asleep for a few days." He lets out a shaky breath. "Long days."

Sam nods and looks around. Still in the cabin, and he has no sense of time. Bones is gone, he knows it, and he wobbles to stand and bats Dean away as he teeters to the bathroom.

"Did you find a dog here with me?" he asks and Dean is in the doorway, hovering, guides him back to the bed like he's an invalid.

"I found him a good home." Dean says it quick, no smart remark on Sam's out of place question, and the answer and tone and Dean's presence is enough to settle Sam into a deep sleep.

Dean's wrapped all around him when he wakes up again, and Sam luxuriates in the heat and scent and being able to stare his fill. He thought he'd miss Bones but he doesn't, not even a pang, because Dean is here and Dean found Bones a good home and that's enough.

He eases from Dean's grasp and makes coffee, carries it to sit on the back step and watch the gloaming, the sunset bright with pink and orange and trimmed with prussian blue.

When Dean settles alongside him, Sam sighs happily, leans, and Dean lifts an arm around him. They drink in companionable silence as night insects and small scurrying animals come to life, and Sam hears it all.

He finishes the coffee and stares down into the cup. "Is Dad like, nuclear pissed?"

Dean shakes his head. "He knows you saved our butts and you know he'll never admit it. You just scared him, bad, and he's crap at showing it—but he's glad I found you." He presses a kiss to Sam's hair, fits his chin on Sam's head. "I'm sorry."

Sam chokes. "You're sorry? No—just, no." He grabs Dean's cup and disentangles and goes inside, drops the cups in the tiny sink and scrubs his face with his hands. "You don't get to be sorry, okay? Not to make up for Dad being… Dad. And not about—" he gestures around the small cabin, "this. You don't _have_ to be. I'm who's sorry. I'm who should grovel and I am actually beside myself relieved you're here, you found me, that. That, that…"

He shakes his head and tries the word out several more times. It doesn't quite work, catching and clicking and tugging his gorge up with it, until at last he whispers, "You wanted to."

Dean makes a noise, like he's frustrated, like he's angry, like he's wounded. He cuts off Sam's pacing and takes hold of Sam's arms, shakes Sam with trembling hands, green eyes piercing and cutting and filled with things Sam can't quite allow himself to believe in.

"I ran after you the moment you left, Sammy. Dad caught up in the car, made me so crazy to make me waste the time taking money and supplies and getting fucking dressed."

Sam could picture it, so easily, Dean half-naked and glaring at Dad but giving in because it made the most sense to do, then charging off again the second his boots were laced and no backward glance for Dad.

He flushes with relief and pleasure. Without thinking he cups his hands on Dean's cheeks, slides them down to rest on Dean's chest, feels the race of Dean's heartbeat thump.

"I don't know where I lost you, exactly, but I didn't give up. Couldn't—hear me, Sammy? Couldn't and never would. And it's like…" Dean frowns and he huffs. "I swear I knew where you were all along, and I don't quite know how long I searched or where, but then one morning I stomped up these back steps and found you. Best day, worst day."

"Worst?" Sam holds his breath.

"You were hot with fever and passed out on the floor. Worrrrrst," Dean elongates, pokes Sam to release that breath.

He does.

Dean smiles. It's watery but light, and he manacles one of Sam's wrists, tilts a hand back up, kisses into Sam's palm like it's not everything and world-shattering and flip-flopping Sam's insides.

"We got that sonuvabitch beastie, by the way. Our incantation and your slimy little herb bombs—we did it." Dean grins, unfettered, so proud.

Sam laughs. It's pure, out loud, and then falters. He can't quite explain, except to dig his fingers into Dean's shirt and whisper, "I missed you. I've missed you so much."

Dean nods, studies Sam, and then he licks his lips. "Sammy, I'm gonna—tell me to stop if—dammit, Sammy," he breathes and tugs Sam into him, and them into a kiss.

Sam surges to meet it without hesitation. They fit together, perfect and unerring and lines to curves and hands to angles, and the sound Dean makes isn't wounded or angry but it's definitely still frustrated. They push and pull—clothes off and zipper snags and heady laughter—fall onto the bed, tumble into each other.

Dean's skin is warm, supple, the burns healed and gone. Sam is writhing and responsive and eager under Dean's touch, legs widening and mouth open and eyes heavy as he begs and surrenders. Their first go is brief and incredible, the brush of Dean's hard cock against Sam's enough to send Sam spinning past control, and Sam comes so hard he thinks he leaves his own body.

He lays panting as Dean finishes on his belly, as Dean kisses him all over, pouts sleepily when Dean moves away. Dean kisses him, says be-right-back, is with a wet rag and more kisses and tucks Sam close.

Sam drifts, soaks in the reality of this, the impossible and the inevitable and the only rightness and good thing he's ever going to know from this life. Somehow everything that's happened makes total sense, to both of them, but Sam supposes that's how it goes when you hunt and are a solider and are crazy in love, horny crushing infatuated you complete me we're probably soulmates, with your brother.

"Sammy?" Dean whispers.

He nods, coming to after falling asleep, hums happily when Dean laces their hands together and pulls Sam back into him, kisses the line of Sam's shoulder.

"Dad's gonna leave us here another few weeks. If that's okay with you."

Sam grins, cranes around, meets Dean's kiss. Dean lifts and Sam rolls and Dean lowers onto him, begins a slow, lazy rut, and Sam closes his eyes.

The following several weeks are just as slow and lazy, and he takes Dean on walks to show off the boulders and pinion pines and views, to the bookstore where the owner tells them about the new arrivals room, to the convenience store where Dean talks car-talk with the clerk and scores extra beers, past the motel manager who waves because Dean charmed her into thinking they'd arrived the day he showed up to find Sam there.

Dean walks right alongside him, wherever they go, is comfortable everywhere, pulls Sam against him to nap in the sunshine, backs Sam into a darkened bookshelf for necking and rubbing off on each others' thigh, gets a cold hand up his shirt in the drinks cooler aisle, tugs him quick past the manager who wants to gossip to fuck Sam into the mattress.

Sam reads fifty books, returns them all to the used bookstore to be sold again. Dean buys a disposable grill at the grocery store and makes them burgers. They keep their things at the ready for when Dad arrives, and Sam is resigned to, okay with it happening. Because he'll leave with Dean, Dean who's crazy horny for him, who came to find him, who listens and needs him and caretakes, because Dean loves him.


End file.
